


We Could Be Kissing

by arcadesintheneighbourhood



Category: The Good Place (TV)
Genre: F/M, Love, Love Confessions, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-24 01:01:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17091101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arcadesintheneighbourhood/pseuds/arcadesintheneighbourhood
Summary: Eleanor’s POV during the “Derek” scene





	We Could Be Kissing

_We could be kissing soon._

The thought dripped on Eleanor and she knew she was getting her hopes up. Her eyes were shining and her back was straightening and a smile pulled back on her lips like a drawstring to a curtain. But for once, just once, in her life she felt like being hopeful.

Her whole life she had craved love but denied her desire. She drowned out her need with noise- with salt water that tingled her skin, with margarita glass rims that cut her tongue, with music she swayed to by herself in the club. And still, in all of those 34 years of drowning she never felt as happy as when she was with Chidi, watching him hunched over papers, murmuring nonsense and marking sentences with blue pen. She thought maybe somewhere along the way he had stopped his drowning, too, when he glanced at her and smiled, when he quirked an eyebrow at her anecdotes, when he laughed with her and it was warm and deep and true.

And maybe, she thought, they could have it again. They could lie together in bed and kiss, and he could brush the stray hair from her forehead, and she could press kisses against his shoulder while he held her. They could be together again. They could fall in love again. They could finally be happy again.

_I’m sorry, but I don’t think I do._

And just like that, Eleanor shatters onto the floor. She doesn’t know who or where she is, and she’s drowning in a place she’s never been, one where she’s vulnerable and lost and scrambling, one where she’s pretending and lying and not convincing, to herself included. When Michael comes in, she successfully dodges Chidi and moves away, hoping to forget she ever showed him, forget she ever asked.

But when she comes back to the living room, Chidi’s waiting. He’s sitting on the couch, hands clasped and legs tight. He opens his mouth to say something, anything, but silence seizes his lips instead. Eleanor waves it off and laughs, telling him he doesn’t have to worry about it, no big deal, but walking up the steps to the ledge, she drowns all over again.

_We could’ve been kissing right now._

She shatters onto the bedroom floor.


End file.
